


As If in a New Orbit

by orphan_account



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Gen, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-02-28
Updated: 2012-02-28
Packaged: 2017-11-04 16:23:34
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,781
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/395806
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It's not like anything actually substantial changes when John Watson begins to show up systematically at Sherlock Holmes' side.</p>
            </blockquote>





	As If in a New Orbit

It's not like anything actually substantial changes when John Watson begins to show up systematically at Sherlock Holmes' side.

Sherlock is still the absolute wanker he always was. He eyes Greg over a corpse, his pale eyes filled with mirth and condescension, and doesn't hesitate one second to proclaim Greg an absolute idiot for missing the clues – the curl of a finger, the tint of a lipstick, the position of a body relative to the mathematical certainty of the walls. He's used to that by now; he lets it pass, he gives Sherlock his two minutes and more, more if he needs it, so much more, because really, deep down, he knows there are lives at stake and enduring Sherlock Holmes will help save them. It doesn't necessarily make him like him more, but there is still a strange tenderness when he watches Sherlock follow the curve of a dead face with his hand (a strange, alien kind of reverence in his fingers, a light touch, a kind of respect none of his officers pay to the bodies – though he knows that his officers respect the person of the corpse a whole deal more than Sherlock does, but it's the _physicality_ of it that they can't match, the respect for cells, for substances, for whatever is caught under a fingernail. Sherlock has no eye whatsoever for who this person was – who were they married to? Did they have children? Did they love? Did they hate? Did they deserve to die? Did they deserve to die the way they did? Does anyone ever deserve to die, anywhere? Is that his job, deciding who deserves it? In some ways it is and it makes him sick at times; he still throws up into trash cans now and then after all this time, and Sherlock sometimes makes it worse, talking about it as if it's mathematics until Greg has to excuse himself and hide the onset of tears behind the excuse of a cold; a running nose, a cough. Sherlock doesn't care about any of it except the body itself, a stretch of canvas on which he can spray himself and his ideas, he wants to know these cells, wants to be inside them in a way, and somehow it's endearing, even if Sherlock doesn't give a single fuck about who these people _were_ ). Sherlock Holmes does all of it to save himself on the surface of it, but then the Moriarty thing happens and Greg is there while Sherlock loses one of the hostages, hears the bang on the other side, literally hears her death, has been the one privileged person to hear her final words and the rush of sound that was her final moment of consciousness – and he sees Sherlock's face, and in that moment knows with a gut-clenching certainty that it hasn't all been in vain, that this person who can save all of them isn't empty, isn't just a shell, is so much more than he himself can handle. He _minds_. He cares in his way, even if it is only the illogic of it he hates. He would have done everything he could to save that old woman. It tickles him intellectually, sure, and Greg is sure he wouldn't have bothered otherwise, but when he hits the hanging up button on his phone there is something in his face that strongly says that there is more. He wanted to have her saved for her. Even if he had no clue who she was or how old, exactly, and how many more years she had statistically. He wanted her to live.

And it's not new, per se; nothing substantial changes. Sherlock has always had that slight clouding over of the strangeness, the alien blankness of his eyes when he knew people were about to die or had died or would die. And he still doesn't give a single fuck about them, not really, but Greg looks at him sometimes as he hovers over a particularly gruesome murder scene and feels something in the subduedness of his movements that suggests that, god help us, of all people Sherlock Holmes actually cares a little, in a minute, round-about way.

So nothing new, really. Still, John Watson's presence makes it all stand out a bit more. It takes Greg quite a while to decide whether it's just the contrast against the warmth, the easily read face of the doctor that makes the difference or if there is actually any tangible difference in Sherlock – and he can never really decide it, he can never catch them in a straight-forward moment together although he knows there must be some, he can never catch Sherlock with quite the same look of secretly disgusted fascination he had before John Watson was his shadow, his sounding board, his not-evil twin.

So he doesn't know. He doesn't know if John Watson is actually good for Sherlock, but it's definitely good for _him_ , and for his team, the members of which can sometimes complain and vent to Watson about Holmes because he allows them to, even if Greg can sense the silent stiffening of his body whenever someone says something about Sherlock he doesn't agree with. Utter wanker: John Watson doesn't even look up. Incapable of feelings: John Watson rolls his eyes in a small way that says many things. Murdering psychopath: John Watson is almost obvious and laughs into the collar of his scruffy coat. John Watson likes most of them, Greg knows; he likes Greg at the very least, and tries to talk to him sometimes about Sherlock, which makes Greg feel like he's overvalued, because there is literally nothing he could tell the doctor that he doesn't know – after two weeks John Watson knows Sherlock Holmes more intimately than Greg could ever get close to in five years, and it's something of a shock, but also something of a relief.

He decides to watch more closely, to follow the lead Sherlock has exasperatedly tried to get him to follow for the past years; but he doesn't watch the bodies, because he knows what they mean to Sherlock and what they do for him (the same thing the heroin did and that's why that's _why_ Greg calls him for cases he knows full well Sherlock will refuse, because he just has to try, he has to keep Sherlock occupied as much as he genuinely needs him, he doesn't want the same thing to happen over and over again, he's too old for that, too tired, and he despite himself cares too fucking much about Sherlock Holmes). When he watches, he sees how John Watson says things that propel Sherlock's mind further – even if the doctor himself isn't quite as brilliant (and really, who is?) he can provide that final step that bridges the gap between Sherlock's frustration and his magnificence, he is that bridge, that solid stone underfoot, that says nothing or not a lot but bears everything across. When he watches, he sees how they avoid each other's gazes often at the crime scenes and then touch very surreptitiously just before they're about to leave, as if saying _this is more than enough for one day_ or _I know what you're thinking tell me all about it_ and sometimes even maybe _let's go home together_ and honestly, he never thought Sherlock would ever be home somewhere, but he's at their Christmas party and though John Watson has his oblivious girlfriend at his side and Sherlock presses a chaste, but meaning-so-much-more kiss to Molly Hooper's face, he doesn't miss the moments they share, leaning into each other over the laptop; John finishing Sherlock's absolutely offensive deductions at a time like that, trying to stop them from happening; John downing his drink, drowning in second-hand embarrassment at all of it, but then finding the pull too hard to resist, and going after Sherlock in a way that no one else was ever abrasive enough to try.

It's not like Greg can see what the change is. He's a good policeman – he's sure of it, even if he sometimes feels sweat break out at his temple when he's standing next to Sherlock – but he doesn't catch it, can't name it. Yet as he zones in, in his own, deliberate way, he sees little things; how Sherlock sometimes gets a little tongue-tied when he tries to explain why the victim wasn't murdered, but committed suicide because of a failed relationship, a lost love, and despite his proclamations of dullness and disappointment at that he stands over those people for just a fraction of a second longer than is strictly necessary – and he sees how John watches him then, with a small kind of wonder in his eyes – and he sees how Sherlock trails his hand over the bodies in an ever more considerate way – and he sees how John glances at him as he takes his place on the other side of the corpse, as if thanking him for his gentleness – and he sees how John's face twists at the blood, at the guts, at the inside turned into the outside they all have to endure at times, at the human beings who have given everything to the outside world in their deaths – and he sees how Sherlock looks at John then, as if he knows exactly, precisely, in Sherlock-like excruciating detail what Greg can only guess at wildly about John's time in the war – and he sees how they walk off together, waiting until they are too far away for Greg to properly see it, but still close enough for him to think that they slip their hands into each other's coat pockets at times like that. Or at least walk so close to each other and so in sync with each other that it looks that way.

He wonder at it quite a lot. He wonders if John Watson knows about Sherlock's violence, his fight with heroin, his risk. He wonders if John knows that Sherlock has disappeared a number of times in the years that Greg has known him, leaving absolutely nothing behind, vanishing so cleanly that sometimes Greg worried that he might have imagined him.

But then he sees the looks that sometimes pass between them when they know everyone else to be occupied – and there is so little there, such a small flick of an eyelid, such a minute pull at the corner of a mouth that he would think nothing of it between two other people, but between Sherlock Holmes and John Watson it all acquires a gravity he didn't think was possible to be attained in micro-seconds. He has a feeling John Watson definitely doesn't know all of it, but then, neither does he, not by any stretch of the imagination, and John might actually know things that Greg can't even imagine existing inside Sherlock, even if John doesn't know every detail of his stints in rehab or his time spent on the streets. He knows enough. That's for sure. He still sticks with Sherlock. The betting pool inside the Yard office gets abandoned after a year, even the people who had optimistically put their money on John staying with Sherlock for ten months or more losing their interest in the not inconsiderable profit, because it's quite obvious John Watson isn't going anywhere, and upping the stakes just seems useless.

And nothing substantial changes: Sherlock is insufferable as ever, spitting on everything Greg wants his team to stand for, and he's still as smug as ever when Greg has to concede he needs him for something. Greg catches him being as high-risk as always, lingering just a second too long over the cocaine lines in a drugs den. He still doesn't give the tiniest of fucks.

But then John Watson walks through the door, and with a gentle touch to Sherlock's elbow steers him away from the cocaine, and talks to him about the bodies, and feeds into whatever it is that's keeping Sherlock clean these days, and maybe _is_ whatever it is that's keeping Sherlock clean these days, these years. He asks Sherlock what he can tell about the corpses' lives, and Sherlock of course knows more than anyone ever had the right to, but then he has the right in Greg's eyes because he always finishes his exposé by looking at John, and then looking at the body, as if seeing it again.

His work isn't better. It also doesn't suffer. He's as competently brilliant as ever.

But Greg sometimes thinks: thank god for John Watson.

Because when the time comes when they will need Sherlock Holmes to be human in order to save them all, John Watson will be orchestrating all of it, tapping almost unnoticedly against Sherlock's shoulder and reminding him – well – reminding him of _something_. Something that Greg supposes has to do with the frailty of things, and the too-open penetrability of the skin of dead people, and how that isn't so diferent with living people. And, thank god, Sherlock will look at him and will understand at least to some degree what he's saying, and will hover his hands over dead bodies, and fan that flame within him that wants him to save people, save himself, save himself while saving other people.

And John is his bridge over which Greg can cross to meet Sherlock. It has gotten easier with John around, that's for sure. He buys John quite a lot of drinks quite frequently, and salutes in the same way every time, with a _cheers_ in his mouth but a _thank god you're here to carry him across_ in his mind. John Watson isn't quite as observant as Sherlock Holmes but Greg knows he can feel the second salute, and knows that he accepts it with his usual uncomfortable humility.

There is no substantial, measurable change. But Greg only has to turn his back to them for a second to find them looking at each other with an indeterminable depth in their eyes when he turns back. So there is, there is a change.

And Greg is just really fucking grateful for John Watson. John Watson, the light that guides Sherlock Holmes back from his rocking moments spent at sea.

There's no one else who could do it in quite the same way. And that's what he tells John with his eyes when he buys him another lager after a specially gruesome case. John clinks his glass against Greg's, and meets his eyes, and there is so much Greg can't read, but what he can read is: _you're the most welcome you will ever be_.

And that, that expression, is the reason Greg can still sleep at night. There is a force that will fight. He's definitely part of it but he also stands outside it. That doesn't matter. There is a force that will fight.

There is a force that will fight, his brain sighs as he reaches over to the lamp on his night stand and he finally closes his eyes after days of harrowing work. And he can sleep safely, knowing that somewhere, John Watson is looking at Sherlock Holmes, resisting sleep, putting his mind up for examination by one of the most intimidating men to ever walk the earth. He can sleep safely, because for some reason Sherlock Holmes cherishes John Watson's mind like nothing he has ever cherished. And, stumblingly, weirdly, he has started to expand his horizon.

No one is alone, Greg thinks to himself in a final moment of lucidity; not while Sherlock has his John – and then, mercifully, the curtains of his sleep close in on him and he can be away for a moment, being all himself.

No one is alone. He knows despite this warm sentiment before dropping off to sleep that the world isn't safe. The world isn't fair. But it also holds its own solutions. Sherlock Holmes and John Watson is one of the most brilliant solutions anyone in any universe could ever come up with.

And because of that, he allows the tension to bleed out of his shoulders; the tension of days, of nights, of seeing people turned inside-out, doubled back on themselves – and can finally feel the soft warmth of his blanket on him, the peaceful air of the bedroom, and the window, a real boundary, an actual boundary to the outside world that he will have to brave again, but not now. Not now. It's possible to say not now.

It's possible because of many people, very prominently among them Sherlock Holmes and John Watson.

Greg presses his eyes closed, and feels the darkness deepening around him, finally welcoming him. 


End file.
